u/Veksutin

2014 rules :)

I'm considering playing a Hexblade with War Caster and PAM, to make use of the somewhat infamous "Forcelance" combo (Trigger OA when enemies approach to within 10ft, Eldritch Blast them with War Caster spell OA, while pushing them away with the Repelling Blast invocation).

I was considering starting with one level of Shadow sorcerer, because it feels thematic and because I plan to go variant human, so the 120ft darkvision is really nice (the build is invocation-heavy, so Devil's Sight is not easy to pick up). I also like the two 1st level slots, for casting the occasional Shield or Absorb Elements when your pact slots are of a higher level. War Caster + CON save prof also means you are very unlikely to lose concentration, right from level 1.

Would you bother with GWM? I was planning to just go War Caster at 1, PAM at warlock 4, and max out CHA from there. Eventually you get Life Drinker, and you could make use of upcast Spirit Shroud and the like, so the accuracy penalty doesn't seem super worth it; this way I am also not compromising my casting (and attacking) stat for too long. In my view, GWM could wait until warlock 16, if that ever happens.

My main question though is, have you played this type of character before, or seen it played? Was it fun? Did the DM get annoyed by constantly having their melee enemies pushed away?

Thanks in advance for your input!

I was thinking of potentially playing a beast barbarian 5/6, swashbuckler X wood elf with Revenant Blade, in a long-term campaign.

My idea was to primarily use the claws for 4 attacks a round, two of which can proc sneak attack. Swash seems fun here for disengaging from up to 4 enemies, with 45ft of movement; the skirmishing potential is pretty excellent.

At times I would probably use the tail as well, but I'd flavor it as lunging attacks with the weapon as well as just parrying with it, so there would be two versions of rage, where one would be the feral kind (claws) and one more of a defensive battle stance (tail). Of course no sneak attack from the tail, but the reach could be useful sometimes anyway. With Swash, Reckless Attack isn't always necessary, so you could be really quite tanky in this mode.

Wood elf can also hide in a bush or something with CA when that's warranted, which is neat.

My main worry is, will this start to feel samey after a while? I suppose it's not the most one-note martial build, but there are zero spells or anything like that to make use of. Climbing on walls at barb 6 seems cool for out-of-combat utility as well, and skill checks will be solid, but is that enough to feel compelling for potentially a multi-year game?

2014 rules!

I have this thief rogue / warlock build, where I'm planning to take just two levels of warlock. I am going to take Beast Speech for sure because my concept greatly benefits from it, but I'm kind of stuck on the second invocation. I plan to play primarily as a melee skirmisher.

I am taking a couple of feats (vuman / CL) and my ASIs are delayed a bit due to the multiclass, so I'm going to be stuck with the stats 8/16/16/8/12/14 for a while (only a +3 DEX). For this reason I was considering Armor of Shadows for free Mage Armor, which would at least get me a 16 and eventually higher, instead of the 15 from studded leather. Not needing to wear armor can also be quite stylish I find.

For similar reasons I was considering Fiendish Vigor, for False Life at will, in case the rest of the party does not have ways to grant me temporary HP. I have a 16 CON so decent HP already, this effectively adds 8 HP since you can just spam it out of combat until you roll a 4. Not sure if that's better than 1 AC, at low levels probably, later maybe not so much.

Another strong consideration is Mask of Many Faces for Disguise Self at will, which is obviously great fun, and perhaps quite useful since I'm planning to play this in an upcoming political, city-based campaign. I could pair it with the Friends cantrip, since the only cantrip I really require is Booming Blade and for the other one I can pick whatever.

Which of these, or the other level 2 invocations would pair well with a mostly-rogue character?

2014 rules

I have what I think is a fairly creative build in mind that seeks to maximize rogue damage. Fair warning, it uses some grey-area rules interactions, so speak with your DM before using!

The idea is to take one level of Dao warlock and the rest in Thief rogue, probably custom lineage. You'll want to take the Crusher feat, and because you deal +PB in bludgeoning damage on an attack from Dao, you could booming blade someone and push them, making them probably take the rider damage and leaving your bonus action free to use Fast Hands to throw an Acid Vial or something for additional damage.

I hoped to pair this with Polearm Master, so the character would be holding a quarterstaff and rapier most of the time, provoking an OA with the rapier when an enemy enters the quarterstaff's reach, i.e. comes next to you. I know the sage advice goes against this, but it's entirely RAW and we're trying to have fun here, rogues kind of need the help.

You could flavor the staff as a long pole, perhaps with a hook on the end that you use for all kinds of rogue shenanigans, it could be a fun RP gimmick and potentially useful for triggering traps and such. Additionally, if you happen to pick up a magical staff, well you have the warlock level to use most of them. No need to wait for the level 13 Thief feature.

I was wondering, say you have a bunch of acid vials on your belt, ready to be used. Could you drop either your sword or staff to free up a hand, use Fast Hands to take an acid vial and throw it, and pick the sword back up with the free object interaction? Or does taking the vial in your hand already take up the free object interaction, and the Fast Hands "Use an object" action is only for throwing it?

Of course you don't have to RP this as literally dropping your weapon, it could instead be some much cooler maneuvering, it's just for the mechanical basis to make this work.

My thought is that it should be fine, ruling that you have to pick up the vial (or any other object) separately seems pointlessly stringent. But I'm curious to hear what others think.

Yes you will do good damage, but you are investing two feats and taking specific subclasses to make it work. Also you are a martial for crying out loud, the wizard in the party gets to do much more impactful stuff generally speaking.

If you want to be less munchkiny, you could forego PAM and just take Sentinel, which will be less reliable but will still get you off-turn Sneak Attacks here and there, if you have a melee buddy.

2014 rules!

I have plans for making a variant human Polearm Master ranger / cleric, most likely starting with one level Nature cleric for shillelagh, WIS saves and spells etc., then going with at least 5 levels of Fey Wanderer because that fits best for my character concept.

It doesn't have to be these two subclasses, as rangers can also pick up Shillelagh from the fighting style, although Dueling + PAM seems great for damage (potentially +8 damage per round, including the frequent PAM opportunity attack), and I want charisma skills because I'm planning to use this character for a political intrigue campaign.

Where I'm kind of struggling is what to do from this point on, though. Both classes offer some nice features, but at level 10 (either cleric 1 / ranger 9, or cleric 5 / ranger 5), the big difference I think is between Conjure Animals and Spirit Guardians (the latter of which you can immediately up-cast to 4th level, CA you will probably never get to cast at 5th level though, when it scales).

What do you think is better, between these two level 10 power spikes, or just in general?

I'm a big fan of wizards, but I'm also a big fan of the charisma stat, CON-save proficiency and Metamagic. I figured you could make a pseudo-wizard sorcerer by grabbing Ritual Caster Wizard at level 1 as a variant human, and taking the Lunar sorcery subclass since it gets the most spells out of any subclass, gaining you wizard-like versatility. I also think the subclass features are generic enough that you could just flavor them as being a magic user rather than a "moon sorcerer".

I still think it could be fun to lean into having innate magical power, and so I would probably opt for the 13 WIS requirement instead of 13 INT for ritual caster, which leaves the door open for Resilient WIS somewhere down the line nicely. You should still take Arcana proficiency for scroll-making, but I think it would be quite fun that you don't actually fully understand all the magic you are supposedly studying, you are just really gifted at using it. So the starting stats would be 9/14/14/8/13/16 (because an odd increase to STR gives marginal benefits like jump distance and carry capacity, unlike INT).

This is also kind of assuming that you can change the added Lunar spells on level-up like any other sorcerer spells. Though that may not be intended it does work RAW, and I think it makes the subclass much more fun since some of the standard spells are duds. Speaking of, what spells would you change, and which ones would you change them to?

Also as a disclaimer, taking Ritual Caster Wizard is likely to be quite redundant if you have an actual wizard in your group, so in that case I probably wouldn't bother with that feat. But of course having a wizard and a sorcerer in the same party is a classic setup for fun RP!